The sensitivity issue

How do you encourage a victim of trauma to share the intimate details of their ordeal without seeming like a insensitive vulture? This is surely one of the hardest tasks facing journalists who have to interview victims of tragedy. I went to panel discussion on interviewing vulnerable people who suddenly find themselves in the news a few weeks ago, it consisted of Andrew Hogg, ex-Sunday Times news editor, ex-Medical Foundation for the Care of the Victims of Torture and now at Christian Aid, Caroline Hawley, BBC correspondent who has covered Iraq, the McCanns and dozens of other conflict situations, Vanessa Jolly, who sets up such interviews for the Sunday Times News Review and Steve Swinford, now on theSunday Times news desk who was the first journalist to interview Kate McCann.

This panel went some way to prepare us for an assignment to write a first-person 'Best of Times, Worst of Times' feature. I interviewed a woman who underwent a double mastectomy after she was diagnosed with vicious breast cancer. She has recently set up a charity which provides a support network for women who have lost their breasts - the Bosom Buddies Trust . I've posted the piece below.

Chrystalla Spire, 49, had both breasts removed when she learnt that she would be plagued by tumours for the rest of her life. As a divorced mother of three children, she wanted them to see that something positive could be created out of her experience so set up a charity to support women who have lost their breasts, the Bosom Buddies Trust.

I realised there was something wrong when the nurses started holding my hand all the time. I had found a lump the size of a large pea when I was in the shower and I had a history of cysts in both my breasts.
I saw this creep of a doctor and he made me feel I was riddled with cancer. He said because of where it was it had to be elsewhere, if it’s in the stem of the breast tissue then it must have spread there from somewhere else.
I remember sinking to my knees in my corridor and thinking “What on earth…?”
I saw another doctor who reassured me it was just in one place and I had an operation taking out the whole tumour and a large chunk of breast tissue.
The tumour was so severe the oncologist said, “If you were my wife, I would tell you to have chemo” but I knew how I would react to chemotherapy, or at least I felt I knew how I would react. I was scared of losing my hair and being sick all the time. I knew I wouldn’t handle it.
Instead I had radiotherapy for 6 weeks. The week I started was the week of the 7/7 bombing. The day it happened was the only day I didn’t have to go into London to see a dietician or something before it started.
I went in the next day and London was so dead. I became terrified of the tube so I started getting different trains and walking 20 minutes to the hospital. I was 7 1/2 stone by the time I finished radiotherapy.
We went on holiday soon after and when we came back I had a post-radiotherapy check. We were all so breezy about it, thinking how we could go for lunch afterwards but they found abnormal tissue.
I got to the stage where I didn’t ask questions anymore. You get to the point where you don’t want to know. It started all over again with biopsies and scans, the doctor said he regarded the abnormal tissue as a marker for future tumours. He suggested I have a bilateral mastectomy where they remove both breasts. No one had ever mentioned that before but I knew I couldn’t live with scans all the time. Every single time you feel something your life goes on the pause button, you can’t make plans for the future.
I had the mastectomy and it was just massive, a huge operation, nothing prepares you for what it’s going to be like. I was in hospital for 2 weeks, 10 hours in the operating theatre. I couldn’t get out of bed for five days.
I had reconstructive surgery at the same time and the first thing I remember was lifting up my gown and seeing that I still had two breasts. I thought however bad it is, it’s ok.
The first implants were horrible though, like having two rocks strapped to my chest, I couldn’t wear a bra at all and one was floating under my armpit.
The recovery was so slow and when I mentioned it to my doctor he said, “You do realise I’ve skinned you from your neck to your breast bone?” That shut me up.
There was a Muslim woman opposite me in the ward. She was in the middle of her chemo and they were advising her to have a mastectomy but her mother was saying, “Oh you won’t be a woman anymore.” She was betrothed so the mother said “He won’t want to marry you anymore.”
It is hugely traumatic to lose your breasts. Before I had my nipples reconstructed I hated the sight of them. They just put on a disc of skin, flesh coloured and flat so you have no nipple. Sally was in the bed next to me and she showed the women the outcome of her surgery. That’s when we decided to set up the Bosom Buddies Trust so women who have had the same experiences can support each other. We made a calendar of women who have had mastectomies and I’m so proud of it for what it stands for. It proves that it’s not just me and that when you have to face something hard there’s no point thinking how difficult it is.
I had my implants changed and I like my breasts now, they’re obviously not normal but put it this way, I had had three children and breastfed them all so my original breasts weren’t that great. It’s a little bit embarrassing that they are always perky and I’m thinking about what it’s going to be like when I’m 70, an old lady with such perky boobs. I hope I get there though.